2r,d COPY, 
1893. 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. Copyright No. 

ShellJLi" 



1898 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



IN PALESTINE 

AND OTHER POEMS 



iBv ft* W< (Stints 



THE NEW DAY 

THE CELESTIAL PASSION 

LYRICS 

TWO WORLDS 

THE GREAT REMEMBRANCE 

THE ABOVE ALSO IN ONE VOLTTME ENTITLED 

FIVE BOOKS OF SONG 

A SELECTION ENTITLED 

"FOR THE COUNTRY" 

IN PALESTINE AND OTHER POEMS 



IN PALESTINE 

AND OTHER POEMS 



BY 



/ 



RICHARD WATSON GILDER 




NEW YORK 

THE CENTURY CO. 






18509 



Copyright, 1892, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1896, 1897, l8 9 8 » h Y THE CENTURY Co. 

Copyright, 1898, by Richard Watson Gilder 
All Rights Reserved 



1 










? - IfiOfl 



) 






THC DE VINNE PRESS. 



^uAxVA x*^^-^ 



CONTENTS. 
I 

PAGE 

In Palestine n 

The Anger of Christ 16 

The Birds of Bethlehem 19 

Noel 21 

" The Supper at Emmaus " (A Picture by Rembrandt) . 22 

The Doubter 23 

The Parthenon by Moonlight . .... 24 

The Ottoman Empire 27 

Karnak 28 

" Angelo, Thou Art the Master " 32 

A Winter Twilight in Provence .... 35 

II 

« The Poet's Day " . 41 

" How to the Singer Comes the Song?" . . .42 

"Like the Bright Picture" 44 

Remembrance of Beauty 45 

Music in Solitude 46 

"A Power there is" . . 49 

The Song's Answer 51 

The Cello 52 

5 



6 CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

The Valley Road 53 

Hawthorne in Berkshire 56 

Late Summer 57 

An Hour in a Studio (F. L.) 58 

Illusion 60 

A Song of the Road 61 

"Not Here" 62 

"'No, No,' She Said" 63 

A Soul Lost, and Found 64 

"This Hour my Heart Went Forth, as in Old 

Days" 67 

"Even When Joy is Near" 68 

Resurrection 70 

"As Soars the Eagle" 72 

III 

Robert Gould Shaw (The Monument by Augustus St. 

Gaudens) 75 

"The North Star Draws the Hero" (To H. N. G.) 78 

Glave 79 

Of Henry George (Who Died Fighting Against Political 

Tyranny and Corruption, New York, 1897) . . .80 

Scorn 81 

The Heroic Age (Athens, 1896) 82 

The Sword of the Spirit (In Memory of Joe Evans) 84 
"Through all the Cunning Ages" . . . .86 



CONTENTS. y 

PAGE 

One Country — One Sacrifice (Ensign Worth Bagley, 88 

May II, 1898) 

"When with their Country's Anger" . . .89 

A Vision 91 

The Word of the White Tsar .... 93 



IV 

A Song for Dorothea, across the Sea . . .99 

A Blind Poet 101 

On a Woman Seen upon the Stage (" Tess," as Played by 

Mrs. Fiske) ........ 102 

Of One who neither Sees nor Hears (Helen Keller) 103 
For the Espousals of Jeanne Roumanille, of Avignon 105 
To Marie Josephine Girard, Queen of the Felibres, 

on her Wedding-Day 107 

Inscription for a Tower in Florence (Written for the 

Chatelaine) 108 

With a Volume of Dante 110 



IN PALESTINE. 

AH no! that sacred land 
-£jl Where fell the wearied feet of the lone Christ 
Robs not the soul of faith. I shall set down 
The thought was in my heart. If that hath lost 
Aught of its child-belief, 't was long ago, 
Not there in Palestine; and if 't were lost, 
He were a coward who should fear to lose 
A blind, hereditary, thoughtless faith, — 
Comfort of fearful minds, a straw to catch at 
On the deep-gulfed and tempest-driven sea. 

Full well I know how shallow spirits lack 
The essence, flinging from them but the form ; 
I have seen souls lead barren lives and cursed, — 
Bereft of light, and all the grace of life, — 
Because for them the inner truth was lost 
In the frail symbol— hated, shattered, spurned, 
ii 



I2 IN PALESTINE. 

But faith that lives forever is not bound 
To any outward semblance, any scheme 
Fine-wrought of human wonder, or self-love, 
Or the base fear of never-ending pain. 
True faith doth face the blackness of despair,— 
Blank faithlessness itself; bravely it holds 
To duty unrewarded and unshared ; 
It loves where all is loveless ; it endures 
In the long passion of the soul for God, 

'T was thus I thought: — 
At last the very land whose breath he breathed, 
The very hills his bruised feet did climb! 
This is his Olivet ; on this Mount he stood, 
As I do now, and with this same surprise 
Straight down into the startling blue he gazed 
Of the fair, turquoise mid-sea of the plain. 
That long, straight, misty, dream-like, violet wall 
Of Moab, — lo, how close it looms; the same 
Quick human wonder struck his holy vision. 
About these feet the flowers he knew so well. 
Back where the city's shadow slowly climbs 



IN PALESTINE. 13 

There is a wood of olives gaunt and gray, 
And centuries old; it holds the name it bore 
That night of agony and bloody sweat. 

I tell you when I looked upon these fields 
And stony valleys,— through the purple veil 
Of twilight, or what time the Orient sun 
Made shining jewels of the barren rocks,— 
Something within me trembled; for I said: 
This picture once was mirrored in his eyes; 
This sky, that lake, those hills, this loveliness, 
To him familiar were ; this is the way 
To Bethany ; the red anemones 
Along yon wandering path mark the steep road 
To green-embowered Jordan. All is his: 
These leprous outcasts pleading piteously; 
This troubled country, — troubled then as now, 
And wild and bloody, — this is his own land. 
On such a day, girdled by these same hills, 
Pressed by this dark-browed, sullen, Orient crowd, 
On yonder mount, spotted with crimson blooms, 
He closed his eyes, in that dark tragedy 



14 



IN PALESTINE, 



Which mortal spirit never dared to sound. 
O God! I saw those haunting eyes in every 
throng. 

Were he divine, and maker of all worlds, — 
The Godhead veiled in suffering, for our sins,— 
An unimagined splendor poured on earth 
In sacrifice supreme, — this were a scene 
Fit for the tears of angels and all men. 
If he were man,— a passionate human heart, 
Like unto ours, but with intenser fire, 
And whiter from the deep and central glow; 
Who loved all men as never man before, 
Who felt as never mortal all the weight 
Of this world's sorrow, and whose hand 
Upstretched in prayer did seem, indeed, to clutch 
The hand divine ; if he were man, yet dreamed 
That the Ineffable through him had power — 
Even through his touch — to scatter human pain 
(Setting the eternal seal on his high hope 
And promised kingdom) ; were he only man, 
Thus, thus to aspire, and thus at last to fall! 



IN PALESTINE. 



*5 



Such anguish! such betrayal! Who could paint 

That tragedy! one human, piteous cry— 

" Forsaken! " — and black death! If he were God, 

'T was for an instant only, his despair; 

Or were he man, and there is life beyond, 

And, soon or late, the good rewarded are, 

Then, too, is recompense. 

But were he man, 
And death ends all ; then was that tortured death 
On Calvary a thing to make the pulse 
Of memory quail and stop. 

The blackest thought 
The human brain may harbor comes that way. 
Face that, — face all, — yet lose not hope nor 

heart ! 
One perfect moment in the life of love, 
One deed wherein the soul unselfed gleams forth, — 
These can outmatch all ill, all doubt, all fear, 
And through the encompassing burden of the world 
Burn swift the spirit's pathway to its God. 



THE ANGER OF CHRIST. 



On the day that Christ ascended 

To Jerusalem, 
Singing multitudes attended, 
And the very heavens were rended 

With the shout of them. 

ii. 

Chanted they a sacred ditty, 
Every heart elate; 
But he wept in brooding pity, 
Then went in the holy city 

By the Golden Gate. 
16 



THE ANGER OF CHRIST. 



III. 



17 



In the temple, lo! what lightning 

Makes unseemly rout! 
He in anger, sudden, frightening, 
Drives with scorn and scourge the whitening 

Money-changers out. 

IV. 

By the way that Christ descended 

From Mount Olivet, 
I, a lonely pilgrim, wended, 
On the day his entry splendid 

Is remembered yet. 

v. 

And I thought : If he, returning 

On this festival, 
Here should haste with love and yearning, 
Where would now his fearful, burning 

Anger flash and fall ? 



X 8 THE ANGER OF CHRIST. 



VI. 

In the very house they builded 

To his saving name, 
'Mid their altars, gemmed and gilded, 
Would his scourge and scorn be wielded, 

His fierce lightning flame. 

VII. 

Once again, O Man of Wonder, 
Let thy voice be heard! 

Speak as with a sound of thunder; 

Drive the false thy roof from under; 
Teach thy priests thy word. 



THE BIRDS OF BETHLEHEM. 



I heard the bells of Bethlehem ring— 
Their voice was sweeter than the priests' ; 

I heard the birds of Bethlehem sing 
Unbidden in the churchly feasts. 

ii. 

They clung and sung on the swinging chain 
High in the dim and incensed air; 

The priests, with repetitions vain, 
Chanted a never-ending prayer. 
19 



20 THE BIRDS OF BETHLEHEM. 

III. 

So bell and bird and priest I heard, 
But voice of bird was most to me ; 

It had no ritual, no word, 

And yet it sounded true and free. 

IV. 

I thought Child Jesus, were he there, 
Would like the singing birds the best, 

And clutch his little hands in air 
And smile upon his mother's breast. 

Bethlehem, Holy Week, 1896. 



NOEL. 



Star-dust and vaporous light, — 
The mist of worlds unborn, — 

A shuddering in the awful night 
Of winds that bring the morn. 

ii. 

Now comes the dawn : the circling earth ; 

Creatures that fly and crawl; 
And Man, that last, imperial birth ; 

And Christ, the flower of all. 



21 



"THE SUPPER AT EMMAUS." 

(A PICTURE BY REMBRANDT.) 

Wise Rembrandt! thou couldst paint, and thou alone, 
Eyes that had seen what never human eyes 
Before had looked on ; him that late had passed 
Onward and back through gates of Death and Life. 

O human face where the celestial gleam 
Lingers! Oh, still to thee the eyes of men 
Turn with deep, questioning worship ; seeing there, 
As in a mirror, the Eternal Light 
Caught from the shining of the central Soul 
Whence came all worlds, and whither shall return. 



22 



THE DOUBTER. 



Thou Christ, my soul is hurt and bruised! 

With words the scholars wear me out; 
My brain o'erwearied and confused, — 

Thee, and myself, and all I doubt. 

ii. 

And must I back to darkness go 
Because I cannot say their creed ? 

I know not what I think; I know 
Only that thou art what I need. 



23 



THE PARTHENON BY MOONLIGHT. 



This is an island of the golden Past 

Uplifted in the tranquil sea of night. 
In the white splendor how the heart beats fast, 

When climbs the pilgrim to this gleaming height ; — 
As might a soul, new-born, its wondering way 

Take through the gates of pearl and up the stair 
Into the precincts of celestial day, — 

So to this shrine my worshiping feet did fare. 

ii. 

But look! what tragic waste! Is Time so lavish 
Of dear perfection thus to see it spilled ? 

'T was worth an empire;— now behold the ravish 
That laid it low. The soaring plain is filled 
24 



THE PARTHENON BY MOONLIGHT. 25 

With the wide-scattered letters of one word 
Of loveliness that nevermore was spoken ; 

Nor ever shall its like again be heard : 

Not dead is art— but that high charm is broken. 



in. 



Now moonlight builds with swift and mystic art 

And makes the ruin whole — and yet not whole; 
But exquisite, though crushed and torn apart. 

Back to the temple steals its living soul 
In the star-silent night; it comes all pale, — 

A spirit breathing beauty and delight, — 
And yet how stricken! Hark! I hear it wail 

Self-sorrowful, while every wound bleeds white. 



IV. 



And though more sad than is the nightingale 
That mourns in Lykabettos' fragrant pine, 

That soul to mine brings solace ; nor shall fail 
To heal the heart of man while still doth shine 



26 THE PARTHENON BY MOONLIGHT. 

Yon planet, doubly bright in this deep blue ; 

Yon moon that brims with fire these violet hills : 
For beauty is of God ; and God is true, 

And with his strength the soul of mortal fills. 



THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE. 



Let fall the ruin propped by Europe's hands! 

Its tottering walls are but a nest of crime ; 
Slayers and ravishers in licensed bands 

Swarm darkly forth to shame the face of Time. 

ii. 

False, imbecile, and cruel ; kept in place 
Not by its natural force, but by the fears 

Of foes, scared each of each ; even by the grace 
Of rivals— not blood-guiltless all these years! 

in. 

Aye, let the ruin fall, and from its stones 
Rebuild a civic temple pure and fair, 

Where freedom is not alien ; where the groans 
Of dying and ravished burden not the air! 

1896. 

27 



KARNAK. 



Of all earth's shrines this is the mightiest, 

And none is elder. Pylon, obelisk, 
Column enormous, — seek or east or west, 

No temple like to Karnak 'neath the disk 
Of the far-searching sun. Since the first stone 
Here lifted to the heavens its dumb appeal, 
Empires and races to the dread unknown 

Have passed,— gods great and small 'neath Time's 
slow wheel 
Have fallen and been crushed; — the earth hath 

shaken 
Ruin on ruin — desolate, dead, forsaken. 

28 



KARNAK. 29 



II. 

Since first these stones were laid, the solid world, 

Aye, this whole, visible, infinite universe, 
Hath shifted on its base; suns have been hurled 

From heaven ; the ever-circling spheres rehearse 
A music new to men. Yet still doth run . 

This river, throbbing life through all its lands; 
Those desert mountains lifted to the sun 

Live as of old ; and these devouring sands ; 
And through all change alone, amazed, apart — 
Still, still the same the insatiate human heart. 

in. 

And Thou, Eternal, Thou art still the same ; 

Thou unto whom the first, sad, questioning face 
Yearned, for a refuge from the insentient frame 

Of matter that doth grind us ; seeking grace 
From powers imagined, 'gainst the powers we know ; — 

Some charm to avert the whirlwind, bring the tide 
And harvest ; turn the blind and awful flow 

Of nature! Thou Eternal dost abide 



3 o KARNAK. 

Silent forever, like the unanswering skies 
That send but empty echoes to men's cries! 



IV. 

But not in temples now man's only hope, 

Nor secret ministries of king and priest 
Chanting beyond dark gates that never ope 

Unto the people; now no horned beast 
Looms 'twixt the worshiper and the adored, 

Nor any creature's likeness; He remains 
Unknown as erst; yet Him whom we call Lord 

Is worshiped in the fields as in the fanes. 
We have but faith ; we know not ; yet He seems 
More near, more human, in our passionate dreams. 



We know not, yet the centuries in their course 
Have built an image in the mind of man ; 

We have but faith, yet that mysterious Force 
Less darkly threatens, looms a friendlier plan. 



KARNAK. 



31 



Far off the singing of the morning stars, 

Yet age by age such words of light are spoken 

(Like whispered messages through prison bars), 
Sometimes men deem the dreadful silence broken, 

And hearts that late were famished and afeared 

Leap to the Voice and onward fare well cheered. 



VI. 

Cheered for a little season, but the morrow 

Brings the old heartbreak ; gone is all the gain ; 
Though the bowed soul be schooled to its own 
sorrow, 

Ah, heaven! to feel earth's heritage of pain, — 
The unescapable anguish of mankind, 

That blots out natural joy! — O human soul, 
Learn Courage, though the lightning strike thee 
blind ; 

Let Duty be thy worship; Love, thy goal: — 
Love, Duty, Courage — these make thou thy own, 
Till from the unknown we pass into the unknown. 



ANGELO, THOU ART THE MASTER." 



Angelo, thou art the master; for thou in thy art 
Compassed the body, the soul ; the form and the heart. 
Knew where the roots of the spirit are buried and 

twined, 
The springs and the rocks that shall suckle,— and 

torture and bind. 
Large was thy soul like the soul of a god that 

creates — 
Converse it held with the stars and the imminent 

Fates. 
Knewest thou— Art is but Beauty perceived and 

expressed, 
And the pang of that Beauty had entered and melted 

thy breast. 
Here by thy Slave, again, after long years do I 

bow,— 
Angelo, thou art the master, yea, thou, and but thou. 

32 



"ANGELO, THOU ART THE MASTER." 33 

Here is the crown of all beauty that lives in the world ; 
Spirit and flesh breathing forth from these lips that 

are curled 
With sweetness and sorrow as never, oh, never before, 
And from eyes that are heavy with light, and shall 

weep nevermore; 
And lo, at the base of the statue, that monster of 

shape — 
Thorn of the blossom of life, mocking face of the ape. 
So cometh morn from the shadow and murk of the 

night ; 
From pain springeth joy, and from flame the keen 

beauty of light. 

11. 

Beauty, — oh, well for the heart that bows down and 

adores her: 
Heart of mine, hold thou in all the world nothing 

before her. 
All the fair universe now to her feet that is clinging 
Out of the womb of her leaped with the dawn, and 

the singing 



34 "AATGELO, THOU ART THE MASTER." 

Of stars. O thou Beautiful! —thee do I worship 

and praise 
In the dark where thy lamps are; again in thy glory 

of days, 
Whose end and beginning thou blessest with piercing 

delight 
Of splendors outspread on the edge of the robe of 

the night. 

Ah, that sweetness is sent not to him whose dull spirit 

would rest 
In the bliss of it; no, not the goal, but the passion 

and quest; 
Not the vale, but the desert. Oh, never soft airs shall 

awaken 
Thy Soul to the soul of all Beauty, all heaven, and 

all wonder; 
The summons that comes to thee, mortal, thy spirit 

to waken, 
Shall be the loud clarion's call and the voices of 

thunder. 



A WINTER TWILIGHT IN PROVENCE. 

A stranger in a far and ancient land, 
At evening-light I wander. Shade on shade 
The mountain valleys darken, and the plain 
Grows dim beneath a chill and iron sky. 
The trees of peace take the last gray of day- 
Day that shone soft on olives, misty-green, 
And aisles of wind-forbidding cypresses, 
And long, white roads, whitely with plane-trees lined, 
And farms content, and happy villages, — 
A land that lies close in the very heart 
Of history,— and brave, and free, and gay; 
In all its song lingering one tone of pain. 
But now the wintry twilight silent falls, 
And ghosts of other days stalk the lone fields; 
While through yon sunk and immemorial road, 
Rock-furrowed, rough, and like a torrent's bed, 

35 



36 



A WINTER TWILIGHT IN PROVENCE. 



Far-stretching into night 'twixt twilight farms, 
I see in dream the unhistoried armies pass, 
With barbarous banners trailing 'gainst the gloom; 
Then, in a thought's flash (centuries consumed), 
In this deep path a fierce and refluent wave 
Brims the confined and onward-pressing march 
With standards slantwise borne ; so, to the mind, 
The all-conquering eagle northward takes its flight, 
And one stern empire widens o'er the world. 

There looms the arch of war where once, long gone, 
In these still fields, against those thymy slopes, 
An alien city reared imperial towers : 
See sculptured conqueror, and slave in chains 
Mournful a myriad years ; and near the arch 
The heaven-climbing, templed monument 
Embossed with horse and furious warrior! 
Millenniums have sped since those grim wars 
Here grimly carved, the wonder of the churl, — 
The very language dead those warriors cried. 
Deepens the dusk, and on the neighboring height 
A rock-hewn palace cuts the edge of day 
In giant ruin stark against the sky : 



A WINTER TWILIGHT IN PROVENCE. 



37 



Ah, misery! I know its piteous tale 

Of armed injustice; monstrous, treacherous force. 

Deepens the dusk, and the enormous towers, 

Still lording o'er a living city near, 

Are lost to sight ; but not to thought are lost 

A hundred stories of the old-time curse— 

War and its ravagings. Deepens the dusk 

On westward mountains black with olden crime 

And steeped in blood spilled in the blessed name 

Of him the Roman soldiers crucified — 

The Prince of Peace. Deepens the dusk, and all 

The nearer landscape glimmers into dark, 

And naught shows clear save yonder wayside cross 

Against the lurid west whose dying gleam 

Of ghastly sunlight frights the brooding soul. 

Dear country mine! far in that viewless west, 
And ocean-warded, strife thou too hast known ; 
But may thy sun hereafter bloodless shine, 
And may thy way be onward without wrath, 
And upward on no carcass of the slain; 
And if thou smitest, let it be for peace 



38 A WINTER TWILIGHT IN PROVENCE. 

And justice— not in hate, or pride, or lust 
Of empire. Mayst thou ever be, O land! 
Noble and pure as thou art free and strong: 
So shalt thou lift a light for all the world 
And for all time, and bring the Age of Peace. 
St.-Remy de Provence, January, 1896. 



II 



"THE POETS DAY." 

THE poet's day is different from another, 
Though he doth count each man his own heart's 
brother. 
So crystal-clear the air that he looks through, 
It gives each color an intenser hue ; 
Each bush doth burn, and every flower flame ; 
The stars are sighing ; silence breathes a name. 
The world wherein he wanders, dreams, and sings 
Thrills with the beating of invisible wings ; 
And all day long he hears from hidden birds 
The low, melodious pour of musicked words. 



"HOW TO THE SINGER COMES 
THE SONG?" 



How to the singer comes the song? 

At times a joy, alone ; 

A wordless tone 

Caught from the crystal gleam of ice-bound trees ; 

Or from the violet-perfumed breeze ; 

Or the sharp smell of seas 

In sunlight glittering many an emerald mile ; 

Or the keen memory of a love-lit smile. 

n. 

Thus to the singer comes the song: 
Gazing at crimson skies 
Where burns and dies 

On day's wide hearth the calm celestial fire, 
The poet with a wild desire 
Strikes the impassioned lyre, 
Takes into tuned sound the flaming sight 
And ushers with new song the ancient night. 
42 



"HOW TO THE SINGER COMES THE SONG?" 

III. 

How to the singer comes the song? 

Bowed down by ill and sorrow 

On every morrow, — 

The unworded pain breaks forth in heavenly 

singing ; 
Not all too late dear solace bringing 
To broken spirits winging 

Through mortal anguish to the unknown rest,- 
A lyric balm for every wounded breast. 



IV. 

How to the singer comes the song? 

How to the summer fields 

Come flowers? How yields 

Darkness to happy dawn? How doth the night 

Bring stars? Oh, how do love and light 

Leap at the sound and sight 

Of her who makes this dark world seem less 

wrong — 
Life of his life, and soul of all his song! 



43 



"LIKE THE BRIGHT PICTURE." 

Like the bright picture ere the lamp is lit, 

Or silent page whereon keen notes are writ ; 

So was my love, all vacant, all unsaid, 

Ere she the lamp did light, ere she the music read. 



44 



REMEMBRANCE OF BEAUTY. 

Love's look finds loveliness in all the world : 
Ah, who shall say — This, this is loveliest! 
Forgetting that pure beauty is impearled 
A thousand perfect ways, and none is best. 

Sometimes I deem that dawn upon the ocean 
Thrills deeper than all else ; but, sudden, there, 
With serpent gleam and hue, and fixed motion, 
Niagara curves its scimitar in air. 

So when I dream of sunset, oft I gaze 
Again from Bellosguardo's misty height, 
Or memory ends once more one day of days — 

Carrara's mountains purpling into night. 

There is no loveliest, dear Love, but thee — 
Through whom all loveliness I breathe and see. 



45 



MUSIC IN SOLITUDE. 



In this valley far and lonely 
Birds sang only, 
And the brook, 
And the rain upon the leaves; 
And all night long beneath the eaves 
(While with soft breathings slept the housed cattle) 
The hived bees 

Made music like the murmuring seas; 
From lichened wall, from many a leafy nook, 
The chipmunk sounded shrill his tiny rattle ; 
Through the warm day boomed low the droning flies, 
And the huge mountain shook 
With the organ of the skies. 

46 



MUSIC IN SOLITUDE. 

II. 

Dear these songs unto my heart; 
But the spirit longs for art, 
Longs for music that is born 
Of the human soul forlorn, 
Or the beating heart of pleasure. 
Thou, sweet girl, didst bring this boon 
Without stint or measure ! 
Many a tune 

From the masters of all time 
In my waiting heart made rhyme. 

in. 

As the rain on parched meadows, 
As cool shadows 
Falling from the sultry sky, 
As loved memories die, 
But live again when a well-tuned voice 
Makes with old joy the grieved heart rejoice, 
So came once more with thy clear touch 



47 



48 MUSIC IN SOLITUDE. 

The melodies I love — 

Ah, not too much, 

But all earth's natural songs far, far above ! 

For they are nature felt, and living, 

And human, and impassioned; 

And they full well are fashioned 

To bring to sound and sense the eternal striving, 

The inner soul of the inexpressive world, 

The meaning furled 

Deep at the heart of all, — 

The thought that mortals name divine, 

Whereof all beauty is the sign, 

That comes — ah! surely comes — at music's solemn call. 



"A POWER THERE IS." 

A power there is that trembles through the earth ; 
It lives in nature's mirth, 
Making that fearful as the touch of pain ; 
It strikes the sun-lit plain, 
And harvests flash, or bend with rushing rain ; 
It is not far when tempests make their moan, 
And lightnings leap, and falls the thunder-stone. 
It comes in morning's beam of living light, 
And the imperial night 
Knows it and all its company of stars, 
And the auroral bars. 

Through nature all, the subtile current thrills; 
It built in flood and fire the crystal hills ; 
It molds the flowers, 
And all the branched forests that abide 
Forever on the teeming mountain-side. 

49 



jo "A POWER THERE IS." 

It lives where music times the soft, processional hours ; 

And where on that lone hill of art 

Proud Phidias carved in stone his lyric heart ; 

And where wild battle is, and where 

Glad lovers breathe in starry night the quivering air. 



THE SONG'S ANSWER. 

Me mystic ? Have your way ! 

But sing me, if ye may ; — 

Then shall ye know the power 

Of the seed's thought of the flower, 

Of the dawn's thought of the day. 



5i 



THE CELLO. 

When late I heard the trembling cello play, 

In every face I read sad memories 

That from dark, secret chambers where they lay 

Rose, and looked forth from melancholy eyes. 
So every mournful thought found there a tone 

To match despondence ; sorrow knew its mate ; 

111 fortune sighed, and mute despair made moan ; 

And one deep chord gave answer, "Late, — too late." 
Then ceased the quivering strain, and swift returned 

Into its depths the secret of each heart ; 

Each face took on its mask, where lately burned 
A spirit charmed to sight by music's art ; 

But unto one who caught that inner flame 

No face of all can ever seem the same. 



52 



THE VALLEY ROAD. 



By this road have passed 

Hope and Joy adance ; 
And one at dark fled fast, — 

Quick breath, and look askance ; 
And in this dust have dropped 
Tears that never stopped. 

ii. 

Childhood, caught by flowers, 
Cannot choose but dally ; 

Slowly through the hours 
Age creeps down the valley; 

Only Youth goes swift — 

Eager, and head alift. 
53 



54 



THE VALLEY ROAD. 

III. 

Summer, and the night, 

Calm and cloudless moon, — 

And lo! a path of light! 

Heaven would come too soon 

To lovers wandering slowly 

Through the starlight holy. 

IV. 

And by this road was borne, — 
Betwixt sweet banks of fern, 

And willow rows, and corn, — 
He, who will return 

Not, though others may, 

The old familiar way. 

v. 

Two streams within these walls 
For ever and ever flow; 



THE VALLEY ROAD. 

Back and forth the current falls, 

The long processions go ; 
A hundred years have flown, 
The human tides pour on, — 

VI. 

And shall, when you and I 

Pass no more again. 
Beneath the bending sky 

Shall be no lack of men ; 
Never the road run bare, 
Though other feet may fare. 



55 



HAWTHORNE IN BERKSHIRE. 

Mountains and valleys! dear ye are to me: 

Your streams wild-wandering, ever-tranquil lakes, 
And forests that make murmur like the sea ; 
And this keen air that from the hurt soul takes 

Its pain and languor: — Doubly dear ye are 
For many a lofty memory that throws 
A splendor on these heights. — 'Neath yon low star, 
That like a dewdrop melts in heaven's rose, 

Dwelt once a starry spirit; there he smote 
Life from the living hills ; a little while 
He rested from the raging of the world. 

This Brook of Shadows, whose dark waters purled 
Solace to his deep mind, it felt his smile — 
Haunted, and melancholy, and remote. 



56 



LATE SUMMER. 



Though summer days are all too fleet, 
Not yet the year is touched with cold ; 

Through the long billows of the wheat 
The green is lingering in t^e gold. 

ii. 

The birds that thrilled the April copse, 
Ah! some have flown on silent wings; 

Yet one sweet music never stops : 
The constant vireo sings and sings. 



57 



AN HOUR IN A STUDIO. 

Each picture was a painted memory 
Of the far plains he loved, and of their life 
Weird, mystical, dark, inarticulate,— 
And cities hidden high against the blue, 
Whose sky-hung steps one Indian could guard. 
The enchanted Mesa there its fated wall 
Lifted, and all its story lived again,— 
How, in the happy planting time, the strong 
Went down to push the seeds into the sand, 
Leaving the old and sick. Then reeled the world 
And toppled to the plain the perilous path. 
Death climbed another way to them who stayed. 
He showed us pictured thirst, a dreadful sight ; 
And many tales he told that might have come, — 
Brought by some planet-wanderer, — fresh from Mars, 
Or from the silver deserts of the moon. 

But I remember better than all else 
One night he told of in that land of fright, — 
58 



AN HOUR IN A STUDIO. 59 

The love-songs swarthy men sang to their herds 
On the high plains to keep the beasts in heart ; 
Piercing the silence one keen tenor voice 
Singing " Ai nostri monti " clear and high: 
Instead of stakes and fences round about 
They circled them with music in the night. 



ILLUSION, 

What strange, fond trick is this mine eyes are playing! 
I know 't is but the visioning mind perplexes, — 
The inward sight the outer sense betraying,— 
Yet the sweet lie the spirit wounds and vexes : 

As at still midnight pondering here, and reading, 
Right on the book's white page, and 'twixt the lines, 
And wreathing through the words, and quick 

receding, 
Only to come again (as 'mid the vines 

The dryads flash and hide), white arms are gleaming, 
A light hand hovers, curved lips are red, 
Locks in a warm and soundless wind are streaming 

Across the image of one glorious head ; 

No more, — no more, — shut now the volume lies 
On that swift, piercing look, those haunting eyes. 



60 



A SONG OF THE ROAD. 

Speed, speed, speed 
Through the day, through the night! 
Cities are beads on the thread of our flight; 
Peaks melt in peaks and are lost in the air. 
Speed, speed, speed,— 

But, oh, the dearth of it— 

Thou not there ! 

Every journey is good if love be the goal of it. 
What 's all the world if love 's not the soul 

of it,— 
What were the worth of it — 
Thou not there! 



61 



NOT HERE." 



Not here, but somewhere, so men say, 

More bright the day, 

And the blue sky 

More nigh; 

Somewhere, afar, the bird of dawn sings sweeter ; 

Somewhere completer 

The round of hopes and heart-beats that make life 

More than a bootless strife. 

ii. 

But, ah ! there be that know 

Where joy alone doth grow. 

Led by one true star, 

The journey is not far. 

'T is in a garden in no distant land, 

High-walled on every hand; 

And the key thereof 

Is love. 

62 



NO, NO,' SHE SAID." 



" No, no," she said ; 

" I may not wed ; 

If say I must — nay must I say; 

I cannot stay; 

Nay, nay, I needs must flout thee ! " 

ii. 

He turned about; 

His life went out ; 

" If go I must, so must I go ! " 

Cried she — "No, no; 

Ah, what were life without thee ! " 



63 



A SOUL LOST, AND FOUND. 



Lo ! here another 
Soul has gone down. 
Hope led each morrow; 
Honor was all; 
Faith had no fall; 
Fortune no frown. 
Brother by brother 
Bowed to each sorrow. 
None had lost heart ; 
Life was love, life was art. 

ii. 

We could but follow ! 
Quenchless his fire; 
64 



A SOUL LOST, AND FOUND. 65 

The mightier the burden 
The stronger his soul, 
The higher the goal. 
Now see the mire 
Soil him and swallow ! 
Heaven ! what guerdon 
Worth such a cost ! 
Love, art, life, — lost, all lost. 



in. 

Down to the pallid 
Figure of death 
Love's face is pressing; 
Listens and waits, 
Beseeching the Fates 
For heart-beat and breath- 
Sign clear and valid, 
Life still confessing. 
Dead ! He is dead ! 
All is lost! —He has fled. 



66 A SOUL LOST, AND FOUND. 



IV. 



Behold now, a moving, 

A flutter of life ! 

Forth from the starkness, 

Horror, and slime, 

See, he doth climb. 

With himself is the strife ; 

Back to the loving 

From mire and the darkness, 

Back to the sun ! 

He has fought — he has won. 



"THIS HOUR MY HEART WENT FORTH, 
AS IN OLD DAYS." 

This hour my heart went forth, as in old days, 
To one I loved, forgetting she was dead — 
So fluttered back the message, like the dove 
That found no rest in all the weltering world. 
Is it then so — all blankness and black void, 
No welcome, no response, no voice, no sign ! 
Ah, Heaven! let us be foolish— give us faith 
In what is not; cheat us a little longer; 
Comfort us mortals with envisioned forms; 
Let us, though but in dreams, see spirits near, 
And touch the draperies of imagined shapes 
That hold the souls we love,— that have gone forth 
Into the land of shadows, but still live 
In memory, oh, most dear ! Beguile our lives 
With dim, half-fashioned phantoms of dead hours, 
Lest the long way grow hateful; — give us faith 
Unreasoned, vague, unsubstanced, but still faith; 
For faith is hope, and hope alone is life. 
67 



"EVEN WHEN JOY IS NEAR." 

Even when joy is near 
These ghosts of banished thoughts do haunt the mind : 
The awful void of space wherein our earth, 
An atom in the unending whirl of stars, 
Circles, all helpless, to a nameless doom ; 
The swift, indifferent marshaling of fate 
Whereby the world moves on, rewarding vice 
And punishing angelic innocence 
As 't were the crime of crimes ; the brute, dull, slow 
Persistence in the stifled mind of man 
Of forces that drive all his being back 
Into the slime ; the silent cruelty 
Of nature, that doth crush the unseen soul 
Hidden within its sensitive shell of flesh ; 
The anguish and the sorrow of all time, — 

68 



''EVEN WHEN JOY IS NEAR." 69 

These are forever with me,— but grow dim 
When I remember my sweet mother's face. 
Somewhere, at heart of all, the right must reign 
If in the garden of the infinite 
Such loveliness be brought to perfect bloom. 



RESURRECTION. 

Back to my body came I in the gray of the dawning. 
Back to my bed in the mold, 'neath the sod and the 

blossoms ; 
Not strange seemed my natural couch, not new, not 

afflicting ; 
But strange now, and new, and afflicting my natural 

body, 
Alien long while my soul took the wings of the 

morning. 
I lifted my hands to the light — then swiftly I followed, 
With fingers that carefully pressed, the curve of the 

muscles ; 
All was familiar ; this was the frame I had nurtured, 
I had loved as a man loves the body so long his 

companion ; 
Again was I 'ware of the brow where the dew of 

sweet kisses 

70 



RESURRECTION. 



71 



Fell, ere forth went the stripling to life and the shudder 
Of battle;— again from the mirror of waters the 

features 
Not unloved of dear comrades looked forth. I 

beheld in amazement 
The bodily presence so long laid aside and forgotten ; 
Overwhelmed was my soul with its shackles ; I grieved, 

I lamented 
As a prisoner dragged back to his cell, as an eagle 

recaptured. 



"AS SOARS THE EAGLE." 

As soars the eagle, intimate of light, 
Fear not the face of the sun ; 
Nor all the blasts of earth. 
Child of Him, the untrembling One, 
Oh, prove thee worthy of thy birth ! 

Let no ill betray thee! 
Let no death dismay thee ! 

The eagle seeks the sky, 
Nor fears the infinite light ; 
Thus, soul of mine, escape the night 
And 'gainst the morning fly ! 



72 



Ill 



ROBERT GOULD SHAW. 

(THE MONUMENT BY AUGUSTUS ST. GAUDENS.) 
I. 

FIXED in one desire, 
Thrilled by one fierce fire, 
Marching men and horse, 
And he the youthful rider— one soul, one aim, 
one force. 

ii. 

Onward he doth press ; 
Moving, but motionless ; 
Resolute, intent, — 

As on some mighty errand the willing youth 
were bent. 



in. 



Onward, though he hears 
Father's, sisters 7 tears; 

75 



7 6 ROBERT GOULD SHAW. 

Onward, though before him 
— Grief more near, more dear— the breaking 
heart that bore him. 



IV. 

Onward, though he leaves 

One who lonely grieves ; 

Oh, keep him, Fate ! from harm, 

For on his dewy lips the bridal kiss is warm. 



What doth he behold 
Making the boy so bold ? 
Speak with whispering breath ! 
O Fate, O Fame, O radiant soul in love with 
glorious Death ! 

VI. 

Eyes that forward peer — 
Why have they no fear ? 



ROBERT GOULD SHAW. 7? 

Because, through blood and blight, 
They see the golden morning burst and bring 
the living light; 



VII. 

See War the fetters strike 
From white and black alike ; 
See, past the pain and scorn, 
A nation saved, a race redeemed, and freedom 
newly born ; 

VIII. 

See, in days to come, — 
When silent War's loud drum, 
Ere civic wrong shall cease, — 
Heroes as pure and brave arise on battle-fields 
of peace. 



"THE NORTH STAR DRAWS THE HERO." 

(to h. n. g.) 

The North Star draws the hero ; he abides 

Steadfast though death defends the unending quest. 

But, ah, more faithful still the love that hides 
In woman's empty arms and aching breast! 



78 



GLAVE. 

This day I read in the sad scholar's page 
That the old earth is withered and undone ; 
That faith and great emprise beneath the sun 
Are vain and empty in our doting age ; 

'T were best to calm the spirit's noble rage, 
To live in dreams, and all high passion shun, 
While round and round the aimless seasons run,- 
Pleasured alone with dead art's heritage. 

Then, as I read, outshone thy face of youth, 
Hero and martyr of humanity, 
Dead yesterday on Afric's shore of doom ! 

Ah, no ; Faith, Courage fail not, while lives Truth, 
While Pity lives, while man for man can die, 
And deeds of glory light the dark world's gloom. 



79 



OF HENRY GEORGE, 

WHO DIED FIGHTING AGAINST POLITICAL TYRANNY 
AND CORRUPTION. 

Now is the city great ! That deep-voiced bell 
Tolls for a martyred hero. Such is he 

Who loved her, strove for her, and nobly fell. 
His fire be ours, — the passion to be free. 

New York, 1897. 



80 



SCORN. 

Who are the men that good men most despise ? 
Not they who, ill begot and spawned in shame, 
Riot and rob, or rot before men's eyes, — 
Who basely live, and dying leave no name. 

These are the piteous refuse of mankind, 

Fatal the ascendant star when they were born, — 
Distort in body, starved in soul and mind ; 
Ah, not for them the good man's bitter scorn ! 

He, only, is the despicable one 

Who lightly sells his honor as a shield 

For fawning knaves, to hide them from the sun ; - 

Too nice for crime, yet, coward, he doth yield 
For crime a shelter. Swift to Paradise 
The contrite thief, not Judas with his price ! 



81 



THE HEROIC AGE. 

He speaks not well who doth his time deplore, 
Naming it new and little and obscure, 
Ignoble and unfit for lofty deeds. 
All times were modern in the time of them, 
And this no more than others. Do thy part 
Here in the living day, as did the great 
Who made old days immortal ! So shall men, 
Gazing long back to this far-looming hour, 
Say : " Then the time when men were truly men : 
Though wars grew less, their spirits met the test 
Of new conditions ; conquering civic wrong ; 
Saving the state anew by virtuous lives ; 
Guarding the country's honor as their own, 
And their own as their country's and their sons' : 
Defying leagued fraud with single truth ; 
Not fearing loss ; and daring to be pure. 
82 



THE HEROIC AGE. 



83 



When error through the land raged like a pest, 
They calmed the madness caught from mind to mind 
By wisdom drawn from eld, and counsel sane ; 
And as the martyrs of the ancient world 
Gave Death for man, so nobly gave they Life : 
Those the great days, and that the heroic age." 

Athens, 1896. 



THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT. 

(IN MEMORY OF JOE EVANS.) 

Too much of praise for the quick, pitiless blow! 
Justice doth lean on strength, full well we know ; 
But the sharp, glittering sword that strikes for right 
Takes fame too easily. Thank Heaven for might, 
Which is Heaven's servant, oft! Yet he 's not man 
Who, when the heart 's afire, no brave deed can. 
Praise thou the clenched fist that, when blood is hot, 
On itself tightens, but descendeth not. 
Aye, praise the sword undrawn, the bolt unsped, 
The rage suppressed till the true word is said. 
Might of the spirit, this shalt thou extol, 
And holy weakness of the conquering soul. 

And on this day, when, one well loved has passed 
From suffering to the unknown peace, at last, 
Would I might praise, as nobly as I ought, 
The hero-soldier who no battle fought,— 
Or, rather, one who, facing fate's worst frown, 
The spirit's sword but with his life laid down. 

84 



THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT. 



85 



The soul that from that body, bent and frail, 

Peered out, did at no earthly terror quail. 

To face an army he was brave enough; 

Martyrs and conquerors are of that stuff. 

And in the civic conflict that was waged 

Year after year, his knightly spirit raged ; 

He could not bear his country should have blame, 

So this slight warrior did the mighty shame. 

Yet Beauty was his passion, and the art 

To paint it — that it might not all depart. 

He loved the gentlest things ; there was a grace 

In his sad look surpassing many a face 

More beautiful. Ah, back, ye bitter tears ! 

He, lover of light and gladness, all these years 

Fighting twin demons of keen pain and doom ; 

He, of such humor that the very tomb 

Might snatch a brightness from his presence there! 

But no ; not bright the tomb. We, in despair, 

Seek through the world again a charm like this — 

That which our friend has taken we shall forever miss. 

April, 1898. 



THROUGH ALL THE CUNNING AGES. 



Through all the cunning ages 
Mankind hath made for man 

From out his loves and rages 
A god to bless and ban. 

ii. 

When he his foe despises 
This god he calls to curse; 

And would he win earth's prizes 
His praise doth man rehearse. 

in. 

So, when he craves the guerdon 
Of others' land and pelf, 

He flings the blame and burden 
On this shadow of himself. 
86 



" THROUGH ALL THE CUNNLNG AGES." 87 

IV. 

If, spite of all their ranting, 

There reigns a God indeed, 
How well he hates the canting 

That framed their sordid creed ! 

v. 

" Lay not to me your hollow 
And broken words of faith,— 

To sin that good may follow 
No law of mine," he saith. 

VI. 

" If, 'twixt your tribes and nations. 

There lives no law but might, 
Not myriad incantations 

Can make your evil right. 

VII. 

" Ye call me ' God of battle' ; 

I weary while ye slay. 
Are ye my horned cattle 

To find no better way? " 



ONE COUNTRY— ONE SACRIFICE. 

(ensign worth bagley, may ii, 1898.) 

In one rich drop of blood, ah, what a sea 

Of healing ! Thou, sweet boy, wert first to fall 
In our new war ; and thou wert southron all ! 

There is no North, no South,— remembering thee. 



88 



"WHEN WITH THEIR COUNTRY'S 
ANGER." 



When with their country's anger 
They flame into the fight,— 

On sea, in treacherous forest, 
To strike with main and might, - 

ii. 

He shows the gentlest mercy 
Who rains the deadliest blows; 

Then quick war's hell is ended, 
And home the hero goes. 

in. 

What stays the noblest memory 
For all his years to keep? 

Not of the foemen slaughtered, 
But rescued from the deep! 

89 



9 o 



" WHEN WITH THEIR COUNTRY'S ANGERS 
IV. 

Rescued with peerless daring! 

Oh, none shall forget that sight, 
When the unaimed cannon thundered 

In the ghastly after-fight. 

v. 
And, now, in the breast of the hero 

There blooms a strange, new flower, 
A blood-red, fragrant blossom 

Sown in the battle-hour. 

VI. 

'T is not the Love of Comrades,— 
That flower forever blows, — 

But the brave man's Love of Courage, 
The Love of Comrade-Foes. 

VII. 

For since the beginning of battles 

On the land and on the wave, 

Heroes have answered to heroes, 

The brave have honored the brave. 
1898. 



A VISION. 

All round tne glimmering circuit of the isle 

Audibly pulsed the ocean. In the dark 

Of the thick wood a voice not of its own 

Might come to sharpened ears; a sound suppressed,- 

The rustling of an armed multitude 

Who toss in sleep, or, wakening, watch for death. 

Beneath the tropic stars that in strange skies 

Drew close and glittered large, I saw in dream 

A Soul pass hoveringly. 

Then came I near 
And questioned of that Ghost, who answer made 
Like a deep, murmuring wind that slowly draws 
Through dim memorial aisles of ancient time : 

" I am the mother of men, and from my womb 
Came all the dead and living. I am cursed 
With memory, with knowledge of what is, 
And what shall be ; yet, verily, am I blessed 

91 



9 2 



A VISION. 



With these three knowledges,— my children I 
Have seen these myriad years grow, age by age, 
More wise, more just, more joyous, yet have I 
Seen mutual slaughter sow the earth with tears. 
In this New World here had I hoped my children 
Would learn to unlearn the path mankind has climbed 
Over its slain to happiness and power; 
For soon or late I know that boon shall come, 
And in the wars of peace the race shall wax 
Manlier, purer, gentler, and more wise. 

But now again the sacred truce is broken, 
And bleeds this breast at every wound and sigh, 
And aches my mother-heart with the new pain 
Of mortal mothers comfortless forever." 

Then passed the Spirit from my dream at dawn; 
I woke into another day of war 
With news of splendid deeds, and victory,— 
Yet still I heard that brooding shade lament. 
1898. 



THE WORD OF THE WHITE TSAR. 

This day, a strange and beautiful word was spoken,— 
Not with the voice of a child, nor the voice of a 

woman, 
Nor yet with the voice of a poet, the melody 

sounded, — 
Forth from the lips of a warrior, girt for the battle, 
Breathed this word of words o'er a world astonished. 

Prisoners returning from war, and conquering armies, 
Navies flushed with new and amazing victory, 
Heard the message, so strange, so high, so entrancing, 
And soldiers dying of wounds or the wasting of fever. 
In tropic islands it sounded, through wrecks of cities ; 
O'er burning plains where warlike death was in 
waiting ; 

93 



94 



THE WORD OF THE WHITE TSAR. 



Armies and navies confronting, in watchful silence, 
Heard it and wondered ; statesmen stopped their 

debates, 
And turning their eyes toward the voice, with its 

meaning unlooked for, 
Listened and smiled with the smile and the sneer of 

the cynic. 
But the mothers of youths who had died of their 

wounds and of fever, 
And the poor crushed down by the price of the glory 

of battle 
And the weight of the wars that have been, and that 

yet are preparing, 
They from their burdens looked up and uttered their 

blessing : 
For Peace — the Peace of God— was the warrior's 
prayer! 

And I, who heard, I saw in a waking vision 
An image familiar long to the hearts of mortals,— 
A face of trouble, a brow celestial, yet human,— 
In a dream of the day, I saw that suffering spirit, 



THE WORD OF THE WHITE TSAR. 9& 

Him accustomed to labor, to anguish not alien, 
Still mourning for men alone in the valley of 

shadows ; — 
I dreamed that he lifted that face of infinite sorrow, 
And harkened, — when lo! a light in those eyes of 

sadness 
Came sudden as day that breaks from the mountains 

of Moab. 



IV 



A SONG FOR DOROTHEA, ACROSS 
THE SEA. 



A SONG for you, my darling, 
For your own, dear, only sake. 
You bid me sing, — so does the spring 
Bid the birds awake, 

And quick with molten music the dewy branches 
quake. 

ii. 

A song for you, my darling, 
To follow you all the day ; 
And in sweet sleep the song shall keep 
Singing along the way, 

Through dreamland's silver meadows with golden 
lilies gay. 

99 



IO o A SONG FOR DOROTHEA, ACROSS THE SEA. 



III. 



A song for you, my darling, 

For those deep and darkling eyes, 
That steadfast shine as the stars divine 

Bright in the midnight skies, 

When the winds blow the clouds from heaven, and 
we gaze with a glad surprise. 



IV. 



A song for you, my darling, 

A song for that faithful heart 
That as true abides as the throbbing tides, 

Though half a world apart — 

So far away is the girl I sing, with only a lover's art. 



A BLIND POET. 

Call him not blind 

Whose keen, anointed sight, 

Pierced every secret of the heart, the mind, 

The day, the night. 



IOI 



ON A WOMAN SEEN UPON THE STAGE. 

("TESS," AS PLAYED BY MRS. FISKE.) 

Alas, poor, fated, passionate, shivering thing ! 
So through brief life some dagger-haunted king 
Wears a bright sorrow. Thus her life rehearse : 
She was a woman ; this her crown, her curse. 



102 



OF ONE WHO NEITHER SEES NOR 
HEARS. 

(HELEN KELLER.) 



She lives in light, not shadow ; 

Not silence, but the sound 
Which thrills the stars of heaven 

And trembles from the ground. 



ii. 



She breathes a finer ether, 
Beholds a keener sun ; 

In her supernal being 
Music and light are one. 



in. 



Unknown the subtile senses 
That lead her through the day ; 
103 



104 



OF ONE WHO NEITHER SEES NOR HEARS, 

Love, light, and song and color 
Come by another way. 

IV. 

Sight brings she to the seeing, 
New song to those that hear; 

Her braver spirit sounding 
Where mortals fail and fear. 

v. 

She at the heart of being 
Serene and glad doth dwell ; 

Spirit with scarce a veil of flesh ; 
A soul made visible. 

VI. 

Or is it only a lovely girl 

With flowers at her maiden breast ? 
— Helen, here is a book of song 

From the poet who loves you best. 



FOR THE ESPOUSALS OF 
JEANNE ROUMANILLE, OF AVIGNON. 

i. 

While joy-bells are ringing 
And the high Fates meet thee, 

Child of the South, and of singing, 
Singing I greet thee 

ii. 

In thy chaplet one flower 

From a far world ! — Wilt wear it ? 

Rich though thy land, and this hour, 
Thou mayst not forbear it ; 

in. 

Thou wilt welcome and win it; 

It will breathe on, caress thee ; 
For the fame of thy father is in it ; 

His lover doth bless thee! 
105 



io 6 THE ESPOUSALS OF JEANNE ROUMANILLE. 

IV. 

His lover— the lover of thee, Provence; 

Thy blue skies, thy gray mountains ; 
The heart-beat of Freedom and France 

Shakes thy rivers and fountains, 

v. 

And makes thee a dream and a passion 
In the souls of all poets forever, — 

While from thy fire thou dost fashion 

Beauty and music and art that shall perish, oh, 
never ! 



TO MARIE JOSEPHINE GIRARD, QUEEN 
OF THE FELIBRES, 



ON HER WEDDING-DAY. 



Queens have there been of many a fair domain 

Of arts, of hearts, of lands. 

Thy sovereignty a threefold realm commands 
Who o'er Provence, and Poetry, and Love dost reign. 



107 



INSCRIPTION FOR A TOWER IN 
FLORENCE. 

(written for the chatelaine.) 



Four-walled is my tower: 

The first wall is for the dawn that comes from Val- 

lombrosa, 
The second wall is for the day that fills with soft fire 

the green vase of Tuscany, 
The third is for the evening twilight that darkens from 

the Valley of the Arno, 
The fourth is for the night and the stars of night. 

ii. 

Four- walled is my tower: 

One wall is for the South and the sun, 

One is for the West and for memory, 

One is for the North and the star that never sets, 

And one is for the East and a faith that fares beyond 

the stars. 

108 



INSCRIPTION FOR A TOWER IN FLORENCE. 109 

III. 

Four- walled is my tower: 
One wall is for the Spring and for Hope, 
One is for Summer and for Love, 
One is for Autumn and the Harvest, 
One is for Winter and for Waiting. 

IV. 

Four- walled is my tower: 

One is for Childhood and the Innocence of Life, 
The second is for Youth and the Joy of Life, 
The third is for Manhood and the Fullness of Life, 
The fourth is for Old Age and the Wisdom of Life. 



Four- walled is my tower : 

A Rock for Strength, 

A Height for Seeing, 

A Beacon for the Stranger, 

And a Hearth for Friendship. 

Four-walled is my tower 

On the Hill of Bellosguardo. 



WITH A VOLUME OF DANTE. 



O thou whom Virgil and thy Beatrice 

Through life and death, Hell, Purgatory, Heaven, 

Led upward into unimagined light, — 

Lead thou this soul the way thou, too, didst go 

Unto the Light that lights the eternal stars ! 



no 



